


Love Every Day... Or Something

by orphan_account



Category: Video Blogging RPF, Youtube RPF
Genre: A lot of doubt for the future and what it holds, Basically the anxious teenage experience, Gen, High School AU, Inspired by Life Is Strange, also inspired by aesthetic edits i once saw, i seem to have a habit of writing things based off of edits, mentions of some people but they're not very important, not sure what else to put here but will add as i remember, will add and update as the story goes on, you get pearl points if you recognize them
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2017-02-20
Packaged: 2018-09-19 12:22:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9440285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: “It’s better to have fun in your own way than to try and have fun in someone else’s.”A high school AU about a bunch of teenagers who fuck around and stop trying so hard to fit in, while also dealing with the stresses of life as high school students. Post-graduation plans, what to do and where to go next...11th grader Mark Fischbach doesn't want to move on. The idea of adhering to a future of working, possibly studying and working in a field he doesn't have any interest in, isn't very appealing to him. Though it may seem childish to not want to grow up, to Mark, all that matters is that he has fun and loves what he's doing.So, in the face of this doubt and frustration, he decides to have all the fun he possibly can.Just for the hell of it.Inspired by Life is Strange and aesthetic edits by thedominobomb on tumblr.





	1. Prologue

Mark stared up at the white-yellow lights hung up around his room, lips pursed. He was an 11th grader now, and had a year left before he had to ‘suck it up and face reality,’ as some of his teachers had expressed. This year was the year they were stressing choosing a career path and looking for work experience. This year was the year he was expected to grow up.

But, like a child, he didn’t want to.

Adulthood was not something Mark wasn’t very keen on looking forward to, having to choose a job and whatever, but he wasn’t so sure what he wanted to do. And he knew himself enough to know that one day, he could change his mind and begin to hate his field of work or study. He hated the idea of having to adhere to a working society. He didn’t want to grow up, he didn’t want to become an adult, he just wanted to stay a student forever. He loved to learn but not to work, and he loved his friends…

… His friends.

By this time, a few of them had already graduated, namely Bob and Wade, and Tyler had transferred to the bigger Laurens High downtown over the summer break, leaving him with a new stepbrother who’d just moved in, and a friend he’d become estranged with over said summer break because he actually has plans and knows what he wants to do-- could he even call said friend a friend anymore if they didn't talk?

“I DON’T KNOW WHAT I WANT TO DO!” He yelled, sitting up and throwing his pillow at the opposite wall and watching it land atop his dresser and knock one of his hats off of it.

At the exact same moment, a knock at his door. And then it opened. A tuft of blue hair gingerly peeked in, and Mark sees his new stepbrother behind the door.

“Mom says dinner is ready,” He said, and Mark grabbed the pillow from his dresser and put it back onto his bed. “so… come down whenever you’re done having your teen angst crisis.  
“Oh my god, I’m not having a teen angst crisis, Ethan. You wouldn’t understand, you’re just 14.” Mark scoffed before swinging his legs off the side of his bed and standing.  
“What do you mean I wouldn’t understand?” Ethan stepped into the room, frowning. “Just because I’m younger doesn’t mean I don’t know anything, you know.” He said matter-of-factly, crossing his arms as Mark opened his door a little wider to leave.  
“Yeah, whatever.” Mark rolled his eyes and stepped out into the hallway. “But believe me, you’ll have no idea what I’m talking about ‘till you get to my age. They’re going to force you to start looking at careers, at classes you have to take to get into certain colleges, and all of that garbage.”  
Ethan’s brows furrowed, but he relaxes. “... Are you saying you don’t know what to do?”  
“It’s not that I don’t know what to do.” Mark says lowly as he begins to descend down the stairs. “It’s that I don’t know what I want to do. And even if I do find that out, I don’t want to become an adult.”  
Ethan frowned yet. “I don’t think anybody wants to become an adult, but you have to.”  
Mark looked back at him, eyes glaring daggers. “Just because I have to does _not_ mean that I will.”

—

Sean sat down on his bed, exhausted from moving a bunch of boxes in and setting up his desk and dresser. He leans back on his hands and looks out the window, seeing dusk fall and the purples and pinks bleeding into oranges and reds. “I think that’s enough. I have the necessities set up, like my work desk, and stuff… I should get some rest.” He mumbled absentmindedly to himself, emptying his backpack. “I’m gonna need to sort out all my stuff, and might ask mum and dad to buy me a notebook or two for school.”

He sighed, removing his hat. “I start school on Monday… I wonder what American schooling is like.” He questioned, laying down on his bed. “I’ve always heard that it’s hard… They force you to do all kinds of stupid shit and stupid classes.”

His first day in America, and though he was so excited about moving to a whole new country, he felt the ‘homesickness’ set in. Sean sat up and opened his window, looking out and feeling the crisp fall breeze whip gently against his cheeks. He at least lived in a nice little house close to a park and forest, so he could just feel right at home should he get used to it. He’d have to learn the paths in and around and find some perfect hangout spots to chill.

He used to do that all the time. 

Late at night, just past supper time, he’d gather his friends and they’d all walk around the forest and spend a few hours just talking and hanging out in a gazebo in the eastern part of the park, laughing and laughing and listening to the sounds of the birds and the trees. He missed it, and he missed his friends. But this was a new start.

Sean laid back down on his bed and closed his eyes. He’d just have to make new friends at this new school and gain new experiences with them. He’d have to learn all kinds of things and all kinds of customs and all kinds of things about this new, foreign country.

“Sean!” He heard his mother call from downstairs. “Get your shoes on, we’re going out to eat tonight!”

He shoots up and grabs his hat again. “Coming!”

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad here and he was just making everything out to be worse than it is. Sean shook his head to clear his mind and stretched. America shouldn’t be too terrible. He was going to be just fine.

_ How could you forget? _ He asked himself as he slipped his shoes back on. _ Look forward, Jackaboy. That’s what you always gotta do. _

He closed the door behind him and quickly made his way down the stairs.

_ Live in the now. _

—

Leaning back in his chair, Nate yawned.

“Took me a long freakin’ hour but at least that math assignment is done. Jeez.” He grumbled, tucking the sheet away into his notebook for safekeeping. “He always assigns homework, but doesn’t he realize he’s the one putting himself up to marking all of it? He’s old, he should calm down and give himself a break…”

Nate stashed away that notebook and looked to his side, at his piano.

It had finally come to the time in his life where teachers were dropping passive hints that maybe he should choose a more ‘profitable’ career other than music. And it was bumming him. He listened silently, faking smiles and agreeing to a degree, while inside he boiled with hatred because how dare you try to suggest I do something else other than what I’m best at and what I’m passionate about and what I love most, you bastards.

He frowned and got up from his desk, grabbing his guitar at the foot of his bed and sitting on the edge of it, strumming a few chords and playing the intro to a song.

Nate slammed his hand down over the strings. "I'm not going to give up one the one thing I'm passionate about." He said sternly to himself before moving back to his desk and taking out a clear file stuffed with lyric sheets.

"No matter what, I'm not going to give up music. I've already released a single or two. I'll make it into a profitable career, alright." He began, searching through his pile of papers for a song he'd been working on recently.

He smiled and grabbed his capo, straightening out the sheet and strumming out the chords to get to the sound he wanted. "'Choose a path that will make you successful.' Over my dead body will I choose success through something I hate over something I'll work hard to succeed at."

"I will break out of my shell, and I WILL succeed in music." 

He strummed the intro to the song and leaned back in his chair. 

"No matter what anyone says. I will."

And he softly, he began to sing. 

_ I have to. Otherwise what would be the point? _

"Nathan!" A knock resounded on his door and he turned around, watching his mother pop in. "It's getting late, better sleep soon, huh?" She said. "It's 10 o'clock now. No staying up past 12."   
"Gotcha. I'm almost done here anyways."  
"You better sleep! Goodnight son, I love you."   
"Love you too."

Once the door closed Nate put his guitar back on his stand and turned off the desk lamp.

_ I will not give it up. _

_ \-- _

Matthew walked around his room, monologue in his hands.

"... Except... I didn't know what to do." He said, voice distant. "I didn't know what to do after I graduated. I made plans, but I had no idea how to execute them." His voice grew a little stronger.

"I made plans to go to college, but I had no idea which college." He turned.  
"I made plans for a major, but I had no idea what to take for that major. I had planned all these things. But... I had no idea what to do. So I sat here, on the train, off to my last week of high school, deep in thought... in doubt."  
"Would I ever find my answer? Would I find the drive to actively seek it? I had no idea."

Matthew looked downwards, but lifted his gaze again, brows furrowing in worry.

"All I could think was... what do I do next?"

He turned around and placed the monologue onto his desk and checked the time on his laptop.

10:32 PM.

He'd been given a monologue about being doubtful of the future simply because his coach thought it to be a "challenge" to play a character the opposite of his own composure. He was known in his classes to be hardworking and most likely to be successful-- for his entire high school experience, that's what he was known for.

Matthew knew what he wanted to do and where he wanted to go, even planning for another major aside from Theatre for some extra experience to take with him, but he was no stranger to doubts. Everybody had doubts, some more intense than others, which is how people end up stuck at low-paying, general jobs like fast food places or restaurants, because they didn't know what they wanted to do and had to improvise.

He looked at the maps and many textbooks and such littering his bookshelves, filled with books about neuroscience, and computer sciences, and other such paraphernelia.

He looked back at his summer break filled with work for work experience credit, denying himself a full social life to work hard. Some of his friends had stopped trying to reach him because they knew they'd be met with voicemail or a hastily typed "Sorry, I'm busy."

... He was so busy.

Matthew shook his head. If he kept isolating himself for the sake of success, he wouldn't have any sanity left to even pursue it!

"Ugh, get yourself together, Matthew Patrick! You know this." He scolded himself and picked up his phone, dialling a number and holding the phone up to his ear. "Pick up, please pick up..."

"Uh, hello?" A groggy voice answered from the other end.  
"Hey, uh, Mark?" Matthew questioned, looking up at his billboard calendar. "Are you by any chance going out this weekend?"


	2. Today, I Had My First Day of American School

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sean McLoughlin has his first day at River Park High.

Sean stood in front of the River Park High gates, taking in a breath.

There were tons of students flooding in and chatting about, and he couldn’t believe school started so early. He had to fix his sleeping schedule fast, he wasn’t so used to waking up at 6 AM for classes at 7. In fact, he got up 2 hours later for classes at 9:10! No matter how much he tried to wrap his head around it, he couldn’t imagine how deathly tired everybody must feel, and they were _used_ to this.

“... Americans are fuckin’ unreal.” He muttered under his breath, and stepped forward, quickly jogging up the steps. He’d gotten his schedule the previous day and his current matter was finding his classes.

First block? History. Now to just find the damn room.

After a few minutes of winding about, he found his classroom and entered, looking at the amass of students already here and chatting away.

“What classes do you have this year? I have Electronics next block.”  
“Yikes, you have _THAT_ teacher? Good luck, hope I don’t see you six feet under by the end of the month!”  
“Did you see Yasemin? She’s become soooo much prettier!”  
Sean looked about and found an empty desk to the left and awkwardly settled in, resting his chin on his hand and sighing.

Something in him felt as though he’d be here for a while. He watched the teacher stride in with a pep that felt embarassing to witness as said teacher was some short, stout man in his maybe mid-40s, and watched him beam at them with the most winning smile he could muster that made Sean cringe.

“Alright class, good morning. I’d like to introduce you all to the new transfer student. Mr. McLoughlin, would you please come up?”

 _Mr. McLoughlin?_  He stood anyway and looked around at all the eyes on him, and forced a smile, which was hard considering how fucking tired he was.

“Uh, hi. I’m Sean. I came here from a little town in Ireland. It’s very nice to meet you all.” He said slowly.  
“Thank you very much, Mr. McLoughlin. You can sit down now.”

Sean sat down with an understandable awkwardness, chewing on the inside of his cheek. He felt as if everybody regarded this teacher as an embarassment who tried too hard to click with his students.

“Take out a pencil and a paper everybody, we’re taking notes today. Mr. McLoughlin, I’ll give you a copy of the notes after class so you can catch up.”

He wanted this teacher-- what was it, Mr. Wells? He wanted to tell this teacher to please stop calling him ‘Mr. McLoughlin.’

Instead, Sean sank back into his chair and hoped that he might give it up after the first day, though something in him felt the need to prepare to hear it for the next 9 months of his life.

\--

“Yeah!” Sean laughed out loud as he sat in the courtyard during lunch period. “He calls me ‘Mr. McLoughlin.’ It’s so stupid and awkward sounding!” He dragged his hand down his cheek with a grin on his face. “And my Math teacher’s okay I guess. He’s kind of an old dude, and he gave me like, 2 pages of homework to do! But he’s chill.”  
“Really? Gosh, American teachers really are harsh, aren’t they?” The light, airy voice replied from the other end. “But how is America in general?”  
“I don’t know. I haven’t really been here long enough yet. But the school’s fuckin’ _crowded_ . There are so many students!” Sean groaned, leaning back on one of his hands. “I almost didn’t make it to Biology today because there was a bunch of people flooding the wing.”  
“Yikes.” The voice on the other end giggled. “How many kids do you think go to your school?”  
“I dunno, probably about a thousand. But even _that_ seems like an understatement!” Sean laughed out loud again.  
“Well, as fun as it was to talk to you again Sean, I have to hang up. It’s really late and I have homework I haven’t gotten to yet.”  
“Oh, jeez! Do your homework!” Sean leaned forward again, giggling. “I’ll talk to you again later, Signe.”  
“Of course!” Signe chirped. “And make sure you don’t slack off too! Bye-bye now!”

Sean took a bite of his sandwich and looked about, the courtyard alive with even more chatter. His next class was what, now? Rooting around his backpack for his schedule and opening it up, he took note of his next class. Music Composition, in the Visual Performing Arts wing, with a teacher named Mr. Pinkerton. He’d heard Music Composition was an amalgamate of a class filled with people of all grades, mostly juniors and seniors.

He couldn’t wait to return back to music. He’d done a lot of drumming work in a garage band while in middle school, and it was one of the funnest things he’d done ‘til he moved to a different town.

Losing himself in thought, Sean thought about Signe’s question, and looked up at the sky. How was America so far, in the 3 days he’d been here?  
  
A lot of people just seemed to mind their own business. Unlike the portrayals of American high school he’d seen on television, there weren’t nerds being shoved into lockers left and right, or tanned, cheerleader, queen bees dictating who could join her posse and who couldn’t. He found that rather good, glad he didn’t have to fit himself into some clique. But it just felt strange to blend in so easily on the first day. He didn’t really feel much gazes cast towards his new Irish green-haired self, and while it was comforting, it felt strange.

Sean finished the rest of his sandwich and picked up his backpack and returned to campus, walking about trying to find the VPA wing, which he found quite easily.

The doors were adorned with ribbons and masks and music note decals, which he found rather cute. Not a lot of schools cared much about their Visual Arts classes, and it filled him with delight that the students seemed to care as much about the Arts as they did their silly Football and Basketball teams.

He opened the doors and instantly heard a trio of voices singing from the end of the hall.

 _“A tiny spark to set it off!”_  
_“Ignite the dark-”_ _  
“And live it up!”_

Sean ran over and peered into the room at the end of the hallway, mystified.

There were three boys sitting in a triangle. One was a blond boy with a snapback who sat on one of the tables and he was wearing a hoodie, the other beside him wore a blue beanie and a tank top with sweatpants, and he was holding a guitar. Finally, he saw another beanie-wearing lad, this time grey, except he couldn’t get a good view of his face from behind. Grey beanie, too, was holding a guitar as he sat on a chair, unlike the other two on the table.

Were they all seniors?

 _“Don’t fix it if it hasn’t broken yet!”_ The one on the chair sang, turning to the other beanie-wearing man.  
_“Don’t regret it if it hasn’t happened yet!”_ The blue-beanie’d boy sang back.  
_“So let’s GO!”_ The snapback-wearing boy sang.  
_“A tiny spark to set it off!”_ Blue beanie.  
_“AND EXPLODE!”_ Snapback boy.  
_“Ignite the dark, illuminate the unknown!”_ Grey beanie.  
_“But since your head’s in the clouds--”_ Blue. _  
_ _“The best advice I found is DON’T LOOK DOWN!”_ The three of them all sang.

Sean recognized the song, one of his old bandmate’s favourites. He grinned, remembering the both of them jamming out to it together.

 _“Well it’s the best advice I found!”_ Grey.  
_“DON’T LOOK DOWN!”_

The two with guitars stopped playing, and he watched them all grin.

Sean felt that he’d very much enjoy a class with these boys he immediately considered _fuckin’ cool._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that is Sean's introductory chapter! You get Pearl Points for recognizing the Music Comp. teacher, trio at the end, and song. It's like a little scavenger hunt game. (;
> 
> Again, please comment! Tell me what you thought, and/or help me improve my writing! Thanks so much!


	3. Today, I Took a Test... While Hungover

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Matt has a fun Monday in AP Biology.

Matt began to regret asking to accompany Mark to that house party on Sunday night. Whether that might be in the tiredness clearly visible on his features or the splitting headache he didn’t have time to remedy because he’d woken up 5 minutes later than he meant to, which is about as unusual as himself drinking in the first place, Matt began to regret it. 

And regret it hard. 

“You look dead.” Stephanie giggled, staring down at her AP Biology classmate with a grin. Matt groaned in response. “Did you get up to some fun last night? I heard you went out with Mark.” She asked, seating herself beside him.  
“I did. And I must have drank. I didn’t intend to, or want to, really, but it seems like I must have in spirit of the party...” Matthew sighed, holding his head in his hands as the rest of the class began to spill in. 

And what a terrible day to have woken up late, too. 

He had a test today, and he knew he couldn’t possibly concentrate with a headache. 

“Hey, Stephanie, do you have any Advil or something?” Matthew asked, and Stephanie nodded.  
“I have some for when my ‘time of the month’ comes, but I don’t think I can give it to you. Once everybody’s here we’ll have to start the test. Are you able to wait until we go to English?” Stephanie asked, looking back at her suffering friend apologetically.  
Matthew bit his lip, but then shook his head. “You know what, I can live. I’m fast with tests anyway, I should be able to manage…” 

Stephanie returned to her desk and smiled warmly. “Okay. I can trust in your ability.”

“Alright class, settle down. You will need the whole class time to complete this test, so make sure you get ready.” Mr. Parker said as he shuffled the stack of test papers. “I’m sure by now you all know how to use Scantrons, but in case you had no idea…”

Matt tuned out his teacher’s instructions, focusing instead on trying not to focus on this darn headache. Rubbing his temples, he looked up as soon as his test and scantron were handed to him, and took a breath. He was fine. He studied for this for a few hours from Friday to Sunday, just before the party… if he could just get his mind off the hangover and try to travel those ‘brain pathways,’ knock down the bush and brush in the forest of his brain, and reach the content he studied…

He felt a sharp pain behind his eyes and put his pencil down, once more rubbing his temples. Gritting his teeth, he took another breath. It wouldn’t do him good to be anxious on top of this migraine. 

Come on Matthew Patrick. Focus. You’re completely fine with genetics and understand it well.  
He picked up his pencil again and went through his test, trying to ignore the stabbing pain attacking from behind his eyelids.

\--

“Mark, I cannot believe you didn’t stop me from drinking.” 

The said boy laughed. “Sorry! You looked like you were having fun, and I didn’t want to stop you.”  
Stephanie chuckled as she walked alongside the duo.  
“Just be glad Steph had advil for me. If she didn’t, you would be dead by now, good sir.” Matthew said matter-of-factly, turning on his phone and texting his parents, telling them he’d be bringing Stephanie over.  
“Hey! You got a fun story to tell a friend one day though! ‘One night I partied too hard but was able to ace a test the next day while hungover.’” Mark chirped, grinning.  
“I don’t even know if I did any well on it. Headaches hurt my concentration.” Matthew scoffed.  
“Everything hurts your concentration.” Mark shot back.

Mark checked his phone before stopping. “Oh, I have to run. Gotta meet up with Tyler. He said we’d hang today after school once he was done his Engineering extracurricular shit downtown.” He stuffed his phone in his pocket and ran off. “Later!”

Stephanie waved her goodbyes. “You have fun!”  
“Don’t get run over by a train or something!” Matthew yelled after him. 

Mark only waved in response and continued to run.  
“He’s going to get himself killed one day.” Stephanie chuckled, facing Matthew, who sighed.  
“Always doing the craziest things, that guy.” 

They continued to walk until they got to the bus stop. 

“I’m glad you went out with him though.” Stephanie said as the bus rolled up to the stop. “I barely saw you over summer break. I was afraid you were going to isolate and overwork yourself.”  
“Did I really spend the whole summer break focused on all of that? Jeez. I’m glad I noticed on Friday night.” Matt said sheepishly. “And thank you for your concern, Steph. You’re going to have to keep me in check for this next year, it seems.” He then chuckled, taking a window seat.  
Stephanie only smiled winningly at him. “We’ve been friends since elementary school. Darn it all if I won’t.” She chirped as she sat beside him. 

“Oh, Matt, what are you going to be taking in college, by the way?” She asked. “Just so I know.”  
“Well, I’m not so sure, but I want to take computer science. It’ll be cool learning about the framework of video games, wouldn’t it? Learning and reconstructing the formula of things that bring us such enjoyment… and, theatre, of course. Can’t forget one of my biggest passions.” 

Matt smiled as he thought more about what he wanted to do. Theatre, maybe even broadway… traveling out to New York and studying there, even. Working and acting in plays, directing…

Matthew looked out the window of the bus, sighing dreamily, though he felt something inside his chest eat at him for the inside out. 

Maybe he was forgetting something…

He sat up straight and pulled out his Drama monologue from his backpack, looking it over again. 

“Alright, Steph, you’re critiquing me today. I really mean to blow people away with this one, as I’m in my final year. Gotta go out with a bang, right? You’re going to help me out, okay?” Matthew said, folding it back up and putting it into one of his binders. 

He shouldn’t let the content of the monologue bother him too much. After all, he knew what he was doing. He, in fact, just told it all to Stephanie! The reason he was given this was because the teacher wanted him to do a monologue that rivaled his own composure…  
… Right?


	4. Cancelled.

Hey.

So... I'm not going to be continuing this. Call me butthurt, call me whatever, but the fact that Mark (and possibly even Jack as well, not too clear) is  _to an extent_ defending Felix's antisemitic behavior is not good. (I am personally not Jewish, so it does not offend me personally, but fucking christ, that doesn't mean I shouldn't care.)

I do not want to write someone who says we respect our oppressors. I do not want to write someone who suggests we brush all of their oppressive behavior under the carpet even though we don't like it and respect it. 

I will no longer be writing anything involving Mark. I can't believe he's standing up and defending Felix's behavior. I will not write and continue to support someone who's essentially defended the phrase 'kill all jews' as a harmless joke. I will not. 

I apologize if you were really looking forward to something out of this. To be honest, I was too. But this is just the way things have to go, I suppose.


End file.
